Middle and High School … from a Montessori Point of View
Ripe, bright-purple sumac berries are quite astringent. Steep a ripe bunch in a quart or two of hot water for a few hours (or cold water for a day) and the result is a tart tea. Add a third of a cup of sugar to make a delicious juice. (Note: Poison sumac is not found in Missouri, but it has been identified in adjacent, eastern states, so be careful.)
The last few years have, unfortunately, been ones of neglect for the orchard. The trees were planted about five years ago, but because of changes in the faculty I ended up in charge of it. Unfortunately, with projects like the invasive species remediation and the working out how to use the surveying equipment I have not had the opportunity to turn my full attention to the needs of the fruit trees.
Enter Dr. Sansone. He’s been my key resource for a few of my earlier farm-school type projects (see chickens and rabbits). But, apart from livestock he also has a keen interest in organic agriculture including fruit and berry trees. He’s been helping clearing the brush from the orchard, spraying the trees for to get rid of and prevent disease, and he managed to get the donation of a new apple tree from the Frisella Nursery, just across the Missouri River from us in St. Charles.
The new tree is particularly valuable because it’s a good pollinator.
I asked Scott Woodbury to give my Biology students another tour of their campus. The last time was for the Environmental Science class, with a focus on invasive species. This time we spent a little more time identifying species for students’ ecology projects; they each had to identify and research a species found on the campus.
One of the more interesting finds was a wild plum (Prunus americana) that we found on the slope at the boundary between the grassy/shrubby slope and the taller trees of the forest above.
The plums are edible. They’re supposed to be good for pies and sauces. The Shaw Nature Center finds that these tall shrubs/small trees are a good sellers at their plant sales.
Propagation from seed is apparently a little tricky. The best way is to process them through the digestive system of a coyote. Alternatively, you have to let them ferment for a while to break down the outer coating of the seeds.
They would be a nice, native addition to our orchard.
Some algae I collected over the summer (July 25th). The creek is almost all dried up at the moment and we can’t find any right now, but I want a student to see what she can find out about it.
I’m taking a small group of kids hiking/cross-country running for Physical Education this quarter. With the heat wave of last week, and having to clear the trail up the hillslope, today was the first day we actually got all the way to the top of the ridge. On our way back down, one of my students had stopped to look at a frond of tiny, pretty flowers when she spotted this beautiful, yellow spider with its brilliantly, iridescent catch. We brought them back to the lab to look at it under the microscope. It’ll also be interesting to observe what the spider does with the fly.
Among the interesting things we collected from the creek yesterday, was a tadpole that was in the process of developing legs.
This is particularly interesting since we’ve had a tadpole in our fish tank since last fall that still has not shown signs of transforming.
More testing of the higher powered stereo-microscope with this flower specimen from a catalpa tree on campus.
The catalpa tree leaf and flower for reference.
A month in the spring can make a huge difference. Move your mouse over the image (or click the image) to see the difference between April and May on the Fulton School campus.
The full sized images can be seen here.
Note: To embed the image above use:
<iframe style=”overflow:hidden;” src=”http://earthsciweb.org/js/images/spring/spring.html” width=490 height=326 seamless />